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The settler and the migrant, and the question of revolution: Lorenzo Veracini, ‘Displaced: John Mulgan’s Man Alone and Guido Morselli’s The Communist’, Journal of New Zealand Literature, 38, 1, 2020, pp. 84-104

24Nov20

Excerpt: John Mulgan’s Man Alone (1939) is a classic of New Zealand literature. Guido Morselli’s Il comunista (published posthumously in 1976 but written in 1964-65) was recently translated into English as The Communist and released as part of the NYRB Classics Series. Man Alone tells the story of an English World War One veteran’s migration to New Zealand, his ordeals during the Depression and in New Zealand’s wilderness, and eventually his decision, after his return to Europe, to volunteer in the international brigades supporting the Republic in the Spanish Civil War. The Communist tells the story of an Italian communist organiser and member of parliament who had fought in the Spanish Civil War, who had subsequently emigrated to the US after defeat, and had returned to Italy after the end of World War Two. The novel also narrates its protagonist’s ordeal, as his unorthodox militancy leads to a serious political crisis precipitated by dissent on a point of Marxist interpretation. Both novels focus on the politically formative experiences that a new life elsewhere has for their protagonists, even if both displacements are provisional. Even though they were written a generation apart and contributed to completely different literary traditions, the two novels can be productively read together because they both tease out the interaction between political militancy and displacement.


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